Kitten Help!

Sooo.... there was a kitten on our porch in a takeout box. I'm probably going to keep him if my dad will get on board with it.

What's are the best kitten foods? Are the quality dog kibble brands making comparable cat food or are some companies better at formulating for one species or another?

Also, can kittens eat an all life stages type formula or do they need special kitten food?

I am ignorant. lol. Tried googling and all the search results were things like, "Friskies is the best quality for the price!"

I picked up some litter a little while ago and a couple of cans of Shiba to tide him over until tomorrow.

Yes, the top kibble makers have cat food too. Some have food specifically for kittens. I don't use the cheaper brands because they all seem to start or have so much corn, etc.. in them. I'm feeding mine Wellness cat food.

I'd love to see a pic of the kitten.

Here's an article I found and also has a link to to quality foods:

http://cats.about.com/cs/kittencare/a/kitten_food.htm

Look for a good kitten food like you would dog food. Cats are obligate carnivores, so something high in meat protein and low in carbs is best. Royal Canin makes a Baby Cat formula that is perfect for weaning babies, but it sounds like your kitty is already past that stage so he's probably good with anything, really.
Can't really recommend a brand, though, because we just feed Cat Chow. It's All Life Stage and was the only cheap food with the protien/fat/kcal I wanted to see. And honestly, for my mom's cats, it does the job wonderfully. Great weights, awesome coats, great health. However, they're also all indoor/outdoor cats who catch and eat prey, too, so they have a nice prey model raw diet going on, too.

I've always fed an All Life Stage food to our kittens, so I think it would be okay.

I'm sure you'll have him vet checked, but I'd advise deworming sooner rather than later. Most kitties have something and it can really wreck havoc on their little bodies if it is a bad infestation.

I agree, good dog food manufacturers usually also make good cats foods. I am more picky about cat foods though as cats are true carnivores, not omnivores like dogs. All dry food will contain too much carbs for cats, so if you feed dry try to find high protein/fat foods. I strongly recommend feeding at least some wet food (100% wet if you can afford it). Canned foods do not need carbs like dry foods do so you can find super low carb wet foods. Wet foods are also great because cats don't drink easily, they need to be super thirsty to drink because they are desert animals with low thirst drives. I don't even remember what brands of dry food we used to feed....I know Felidae was fed at some point and they did well on that but I know their formulas get changed a lot. Now we just feed wet food, Weruva and Earthborn.

ALS or kitten food is fine. Kittens should be fed often or free fed until they are about 6 months old.

Thanks! I picked up some Wysong kitten food, pheasant formula.



Waiting for my mom to get home from her trip with the camera, but one of my friends snapped a pic of his face with her cell. SUPER CUTE.

I picked up some wormer but it says not for under 2 lbs, and he's more like 1.5. So I've been mixing a pinch of diatomaceous earth into a little canned food and sprinkling some Wysong kibbles on top for now. Plus a tiny pinch of seameal and a tiny drip of fish oil.

Pretty much booked solid with work this week, but will get him in next week to start shots at the very least.

Aww! Wysong is excellent. Cats do not always get as much water as they need through the water bowl, so incorporate raw and wet food whenever you can. When looking for staple dry food, pick things that they'd be more likely to eat on their own if they weren't domesticated - birds, rabbit, etc instead of fish, beef, pork, etc. Food like that on occasion is fine though, of course!

What is the best age to neuter male kittens? Do they suffer from the same pediatric spay/neuter problems that dogs do? I know that dude cats who were neutered later have waaaay more muscle. All of our males that were done early turned out kind of squishy compared to the strays we neutered as adults, which seems like not so great for their health?

I've always neutered males around five to six months. Enough for them to start putting on some of that "tomcat" muscle, but early enough to keep them from spraying any and everywhere. I microchip and do their vaccinations at that age as well. Rabies, FLV, ect

My moms current male is an orange tabby who was neutered at six months. He maintains EXCELLENT muscle tone, without that huge tomcat head, and he doesn't spray in the house at all. He will occasionally spray outside, but it's never occurred to him to spray inside, even when he's sharing the house with a stray or a foster, or his old buddy who's since passed. (he's also terrified of kittens, so that may have something to do with it, but so are the dogs lol)

Nice! We could definitely wait that long. I'm not letting this one outside anyway. He's too cool. lol

What age do they develop the tom cat head? Honestly he'd kind of look awesome with it. He looks like he's going to be one of those cats with a huge poofy ruff.

Usually after they start spraying lol. I'm not sure. I've never really seen it except on toms that have been intact for at least two years, and they're usually indoor/outdoor cats.

You could always just wait and see, some boys never do spray in the house, so are obsessive about it. Like, you could probably wait until he did it once, and then immediately have him neutered before he gets the chance to make it a habit. I'm just not sure, we've always spayed females at four months and males at six-ish months old.

He'll probably grow that ruff anyway, he definitely is going to be longhaired.

Nice. I might wait. One time I ran into a lady that was a cat breeder and asked her if she had problems with her toms marking all over the place. She said no, because when they get near the marking age she just kept squirt guns handy and had good aim. Basically she'd just squirt them on their little exposed butt skins the first time they tried spraying and they'd never do it again.

Not sure if that will work on him or if we'll leave him intact long enough for it to be an issue. lol. I don't think my aim is that good anyway.

BWAHAHAHAHA. That is awesome. Good idea too!!

I have deadly squirt gun aim. Comes from years of working in doggie daycare (We would do exactly that to males trying to mark inside the building. lmfao)

I waited a year for two of my males, and they never sprayed. I was getting paranoid that they would eventually tho lol.

Yay! That's pretty reassuring. Strangely enough, the only cats I've ever known that had problems with spraying and inappropriate peeing were female. No idea why because it's the boys that have the reputation. Also, I watch My Cat From Hell a lot and have noticed many times on the show if the cat is peeing around the house it's usually a girl.

We had issues with our female cat spraying, but she had a myriad of behavioral and medical issues causing it. Our males only sprayed due to territory issues, but OMIGOD did it stink! Tom cat urine = gag inducing and it NEVER GOES AWAY. Junior sprayed one of our windows once on the outside of the house and it took weeks for the smell to fully leave the room on the inside. When we would have a tom cat come into the clinic it would stink up the ENTIRE back area. *bleh*

But honestly, I don't know if I really notice a difference in head type on age of neuter.

Junior, RIP, was neutered at around 2 years of age (I think) when he showed up, and this was his build:

An intact male I rescued from being shot who was adopted out:

Compared to, say, my childhood cat who was neutered at a young age:

Or Mikey, also neutered young (and he's still a kitten in this photo):

I think body type and genetics seems to have more of a say in the big fat head than when they were neutered. I mean, yes, keeping them intact would help, but I think if you keep them fit and healthy they'll look just as good, and you don't have to worry about stinky boy pee or aggressive behaviors.